Titanic

I'm wondering if anyone has tried playing the game Titanic with your elementary classes. If you haven't, it's one of their favorite games, and I'm sure your classes will enjoy it too. The game is a cooperative learning game that requires the student's to work together to complete a task. I tell the story about the Titanic, and how it was an unsinkable ship. The game is played placing 6 folded mats (boats) on one endline, and 6 steppers (docks) on the opposite endline. Scatter large and small cones, balls, scooters, and anything you can find in your gym closet on the floor. The goal of the game for the students is to try and get from one end of the gym to the other without touching the gym floor. The students can ride on the scooters to get across, or they can place them under the mats and build rescue boats to get across. While they are crossing, they are required to pick up the equipment, pretending it's their luggage and "stuff" still in the water. If a student touches the gym floor with any body part, for the exception of their hands, they must go all the way back to the beginning endline. Large cones can be used to hop on to get across. The game is over when all of the boats, "stuff", and students are standing on the steppers (docks) without anyone touching the floor. Lastly, to make it more challenging, the teacher can be "Mother/Father Nature". As Mother/Father Nature, you can rock their boats, spin their scooters, or scatter any equipment that is not being held onto by the student's. If boats are unattended, you can send them all the way back to the beginning endline. I time the student's, and they really get into trying to beat their previous time. Every student is involved, every student helps the class to accomplish the same goal, and they get a great workout.

Punt, Pass and Kick

On Thursday I hosted my Punt, Pass and Kick competition for my 4th and 5th grade students. The first two years that I did it, I had every student participate during my p.e. classes. This took a lot of time, usually two or three classes, so I changed how I run my competition. For the past two years, I've held the competition on a volunteer basis. I held it after school to allow the student's who were interested to come and compete, which didn't take up my p.e. class time.

DDR

Last year I applied for a grant from Highmark and was lucky enough to receive $3,000 to use to enhance my p.e. class. So I used this money to purchase a DDR system, 12 heart monitors and 30 pedometers. I'm amazed to see how elementary student's can keep up with all of the advanced dance moves, not to mention how uncoordinated I actually am when it comes to DDR.